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The Importance of Adaptive Networking in the Evolution of 5G

5G is one of the most exciting and talked about technologies as 2019 gets underway, with most tech companies making related product announcements of some sort. The reality of 5G is much more complex than the hype and adaptive networking technology is going to be a key component in the success and adoption of 5G.

The promise and evolution of adaptive networking is linked to a host of other technology trends, according to Steve Alexander, SVP and CTO of web-scale networking pioneers Ciena. Alexander discussed some of the key technology trends for 2019 in a Ciena Network Insights interview, and how the evolution of web-scale networking is a critical component for all of them.

Steve Alexander CTO Ciena

“We’ve been in the business of making networks more programmable, more real time, more dynamic,” said Alexander of Ciena’s game plan. “That’s now considered the way that we’re going to make things adaptive in the future. Adaptive networking is going to be a major trend moving forward.” He added that getting that technology rolled out as quickly as possible will be key to solving the next generation of customer struggles as service providers move toward 5G and web-scale networking.

Alexander pointed out that at any major event these days, a majority of people are using some sort of smartphone device. But user experience is entirely linked to the strength of the network. The reliability, capacity and flexibility of that network are key to delivering on the promise of 5G and the next generation of wireless technology and products. With promises of 10 to 100 times more user data rate per device in some instances, coupled with a dramatic reduction in latency, 5G introduces an entirely different way of interacting with technology. At the heart of that change is, of course, the evolution of the network itself.

“The network itself has to become much more dynamic, much more programmable, much more agile,” said Alexander. “We call this the adaptive network approach, where the network can respond to stimulus.” Adaptive networking hinges on real-time automation, through which the network determines the state of the network and can apply rules based on what happens to be going on in real time. That adaptation can occur in real time based on analytics that inform an automation control and intelligence layer. The network subsequently applies policies and creates a series of software commands in a closed loop, without the need for any manual control.

The adaptive network is an autonomous network and will need to be to deliver on the promise of 5G. That means not only increased capacity and connectivity speeds, but changes to where workloads are processed in the cloud. Workloads will need to be movable based on user location and specific latency requirements for their applications and usage to create a truly adaptive network.

The adaptive, autonomous network will use artificial intelligence and software-based automation to handle its inherent complexities. Alexander believes this approach to building out web-scale networks will eventually revolutionize security, as analytics and intelligence are increasingly used to pinpoint network anomalies. Building security into the network instead of bolting it on enables analytics to be incorporated throughout the stack. This will provide service providers with meaningful information about how the entire IP infrastructure is behaving.

Data Center Interconnect (DCI) technologies are yet another important component to 5G evolution and adoption as well as the rise of adaptive, web-scale networks. Alexander noted that content is already moving closer to the edge of the network to manage latency issues, along with more stringent requirements for bandwidth-intensive cloud-based applications. He cited Amazon research that predicts a datacenter may be required for every 100,000 people in the near future, and all of them will need to be interconnected. Those network connections will require automation, intelligence and adaption to handle the massive scale of 5G technologies and products.

5G is an exciting prospect for businesses and end users alike. But its evolution and reality will depend on a massive networking evolution, with intelligent, adaptive, web-scale networks at the core.

Web-scale Networking

The idea of Web-scale IT is more than just another 'hot' buzzword or problematic disruption. What started with data center operators has become mainstream thinking in large enterprises, and it's now driving changes in service provider operations, as well. Web-scale tools that allow application development to move quickly have also created some challenges for service provider networks.